Rose of No Man's Land

by Michelle Tea

  What’s In Nahant? I asked.

  The ocean, she said.

  Big Whoop, I said. The Ocean’s Right In Revere.

  No, this is the real ocean, she told me. It’s the ocean the way you see it in books and nature magazines. It’s the natural ocean.

  Like Waves And Cliffs And Stuff?

  Yes, she nodded. Big rocky cliffs. Nobody’s around. There’s grass and flowers and shit growing out of the rocks. Tons of bugs.

  Lots Of Bugs And No People, I summarized.

  Yeah, Rose said. She took a breath. She looked like she’d like to be there in Nahant right now, all alone with the bugs on a side of a cliff.

  Weren’t You Scared, Being Alone On A Cliff?

  No, she laughed. Why?

  Well, What If You Fell In? Off The Cliff? People fall off cliffs all the time in nature. I once knew a girl named Cora whose mom died when she fell off a cliff. Ma told me she died hiking. Who knows how Ma gets gossip when she doesn’t leave the house, but she does. It’s like it comes through the mail slot with her checks and paperwork. She told me Cora’s mom died hiking but I thought that meant hitchhiking. I was pretty fascinated with hitchhiking, having seen an old CHiPs rerun featuring a really amazing blond girl in tiny shorts and roller skates who went hitchhiking and got into some sort of trouble and had to get rescued by Ponch and Jon. I think in my head Cora’s dead mom became the hitchhiking blond girl, who seemed very glamorous, and I figured death by hitchhiking was a sort of cool, TV-land way to die. And so I told the other kids in the neighborhood all about it. So Cora found out that I was telling everyone that her mom was a hitchhiking roller-blader and that’s how she died. Cora had long and wavy brown hair and a light blue plasticky jacket with Hello Kitty on the back in a pair of overalls. Her face was all splashed up with tears and she was telling me her mom hadn’t died from hitchhiking. Yeah, She Did, Cora, I told her. I thought maybe nobody’d ever told her the truth about how her mom died. I thought I was breaking some real life-changing news to her, I remember infusing my voice with gentleness. And still Cora cried. She fell off a cliff! she shrieked. Her snot and her tears mingled, her face was a waterfall, the features blurred under the rush of fluids. I shrugged my shoulders. I knew what my Ma said. I Know What My Ma Said, I said. Later, that night, I told Ma what happened. She did fall off a cliff! she snapped at me. She died hiking, not hitchhiking! You’re a real pip. I stared blankly. I didn’t know what hiking was. And I still haven’t ever done either, haven’t ever hiked or hitchhiked, both sports being branded with badness and general death-producing danger in my head. And here was Rose, a girl who hitchhiked in order to go hiking.

  I don’t fall, said Rose. I’m a Capricorn. A mountain goat. We can do anything. What sign are you?

  Pisces, I said. Rose laughed.

  Yeah, you’d fall. You’d fall right in and drown.

  Thanks, I said, stung. Thanks But I Actually Wouldn’t. I Can Swim Fine.

  It was a joke, Rose said. I decided against elaborating on my other concerns about her trip to natural Nahant, such as serial killers and other up-to-no-goods lurking along the cliffs, just waiting for some solitary city teenager to stroll by for their sick happiness. Clearly Rose paid no heed to the possibility of serial killers and their friends. It occurred to me that really I had my whole dumb equation ass-backwards. Rose was the loner here, Rose was the glamorous mystery. She stood at the curb with her tiny thumb hustled out, her chin pointed up like she had a real attitude problem. Her nonhitching hand was stuck to her hip, the bony piece of which jutted up like a shark fin from the fabric of her nightgown-dress. I tried to imagine if I would pick Rose up. I would not. She looked like something crazy would happen once she climbed into the car. The bearer of dramas that you’d become tangled up in. There in the setting sunlight she looked like some neglected twelve-year-old who was hitching to the local jail to visit her pops. Once you picked her up you’d be buying her hamburgers, you’d be saving her alcoholic mom, dragging her sloppy stinky body to Alcoholics Anonymous, you’d be buying Rose a real dress and leaving that gauzy number in a Dumpster somewhere. A whole cinematic idea arced around Rose. I was bummed that I had such a hard time seeing my own theatrical potential. It’s probably hard to get that sort of understanding about yourself. What was easier and more immediate was to become Rose’s cinematic sidekick. I stepped off the curb, my backpack limp on my shoulder.

  The first car that stopped, Rose was, like, forget it. It was some crapped-out number that firstly didn’t even look like it’d make it to Revere Beach, and secondly was already crammed with people, dude-people who looked wicked unsavory.

  Heeeeeeey! the dude in the front passenger seat hooted out the window. You ladies off to the Palace?

  Um, no, Rose said. There was so much in those two words.

  We’re going to the Palace, but we could drop you ladies off somewhere first. If you’re sure you don’t want to come along?

  If you’re sure you’re a lady, the kid in the backseat said. He said it in that way, like when you pretend to be coughing but you’re really saying something shitty. He choked the words into his hands, but there were too many words. That gag works best with words, like douche bag or lezzie. Wicked slick.

  I Heard You, Slick, I snapped at him.

  Slick! the kid next to him howled, poking him in his stupid tank top. All of them wore tank tops, low under the armpits, revealing an eyeful of boy-boobie. Also they sported gold chains and baseballs hats twirled at various quirky angles.

  How’d you guess my name was Slick, beeyatch? The car was rumbling with laughter and I felt sick. I wanted them to leave. Even though it was true that I looked like a boy I just didn’t like how they said it. When Rose said it earlier it was like I was tough, could ass-kick in a fight.

  Get out of here, Rose swished her hands like she was shooing off a small dog. We’re not going with you, man.

  We don’t have to go anywhere, the driver leaned past his friend, sprawling across the steering wheel. He was demonstrating a relaxed vibe. Staying slumped, he crawled the car a little closer. I moved back toward the bench. See, I knew the hitchhiking thing was a shitty idea. It’s so hard to get rid of dudes when they attach themselves hostilely to you. At least they were in a car and we could run in the opposite direction if we needed to. But that’s so humiliating. Running away sucks. I don’t get beat up but I just feel fucked-up from it for hours. Like my mind got beat up. I looked at Rose. I gave my head a jerk in the away direction, but she was ignoring me. She was glaring at them.

  Get out of here, she repeated. The guy in the front passenger side leaned further out the window. He smiled a big smug smile at her. His eyes were sort of slitted and teary and I figured they were all fucked-up. All fucked-up and on their way to the Palace, a totally stupid gigantic dance club complex right here in Mogsfield. The place was divided up into different awful dance clubs. Like there was a room with male strippers where people like my mom went to get tanked and throw themselves at the stage. One section was called Rascals and it was for kids sixteen and up. That place was famous for being date-rape central and it was probably the one where the hoopdie full of losers was heading.

  Front Passenger licked his lips, which were large and chapped. Dry from dehydration, from too much drinking and smoking. I’m going to stay here and look at you, he google-eyed Rose. I like looking at you. You’re funny looking. The geniuses in the back cracked up.

  C’mon Rose, I said. I was getting twitchy. Shit like this is exactly why I don’t leave the house. And then Rose went totally nuts. She tugged her dress up in a quick flash, her hand sunk down her drawers. When her hand came back it was clutching what looked like a dead mouse. A coagulated blood-lugey slid off the side of the mouse, which Rose was holding by its ropey tail. It was Rose’s tampon. The blood splattered the sidewalk. The guys all roared. There was a second of delayed stoner reaction, and Front Passenger jumped back, hitting his head on the rearview.

  What the fuck! all the dudes
screamed. I heard the words sick bitch and maybe something really tired like slut. And then Rose twirled the tampon around like some perverted Wild West hero. She spun it by the string, flicking blood from the drenched cotton, and she let it fly into the car. It whacked Front Passenger in the face. It bounced off his acne-speckled cheek and came to rest on his tank top. He jerked and spazzed as the blob of tampon snagged on his gold chain, as it rode up onto the skin of his clavicle and then plunged down under the shirt.

  Aaaaaaaah, the dude screamed. Aaaaaah, aaaaaah. It was like he was on fire.

  Get the fuck out! the driver reached around him and popped the door open. Bloody Front Passenger spun toward his friend. He banged his head on the rearview again. It was bonked all out of place and the driver said, Fuck, and then shoved the kid in his back. He shoved him hard out the open door.

  Clean yourself off, man! That’s sick! That’s sick! My fucking car! One of the kids from the backseat leaned over and pulled the door shut. Front Passenger stood on the curb and the tampon slid out from his shirt, landing on the sidewalk. Rose dove for it, her grubby fingers wrapping around the string. The thing still had plenty of blood left in it. It was like the Uzi of bloody tampons. She could take him out again and again. I was breathless. What a genius weapon. The car peeled out, leaving their friend in a blue fog of burnt tire and exhaust. They headed in the general direction of the Palace. Front Passenger was lifting his shirt, looking at the long smears of Rose’s menstruation on his chest. He held the fabric away from the wet mess.

  What the fuck? he demanded. He looked seriously pained. He looked like Rose just kicked him in the ’nads. Like she’d done something dirty, betrayed some sort of pact we’d all agreed to. The tampon swung from her fingers. She made it sway like a pendulum. Her big eyes got creepy-big.

  You are getting slee-py, she droned, moving toward the boy. He took a quick step backward, still holding his shirt up, and tripped off the back of the curb. He went down hard, on his ass. Rose laughed. She leaned over him with the tampon. He was shouting all sorts of shit at her, mean shit and curses. I started getting scared again. I don’t think I’d stopped being scared, but it had morphed from a bad-scared to a sort of exciting-scared and was now starting to go sour again. That kid was going to get up and punch Rose in the head. He let his shirt drape back over his torso and used his hands to help him scramble up. He was big and wobbly. He had a tattoo on his leg, Chinese writing. It probably said “Peace” or something. He was a fucked-up white kid who liked to start shit, walking around with a Chinese peace tattoo on his leg. I hated him so much. It was cramping my hands and making me feel wild and shaky.

  I Fucking Hate You, Man, I said. I went and stood closer to Rose and her tampon. At least there was two of us. I didn’t know how to fight, but I bet I could scream really loud, I bet I could make help come for us. If that didn’t happen I could knock his baseball hat off and rip out hunks of his Abercrombie-colored hair, like Rose said to. I could bite him in the jugular and knee him hard in the balls. I could fight a dirty panic fight if I had to.

  You bitches are crazy, he said. He backed up, then halted. He looked around for traffic but there wasn’t any. He dashed into the street. Rose leaned in and hurled the tampon a second time. It whacked his back, leaving another crimson smudge, and tumbled to the street.

  He kept screaming back at us as he ran past Spritzie’s and down the street. Just your regulation Mogsfield trashmouth curse words, the ones specifically for females, like we haven’t heard them a million times before, like they’re practically not our nicknames by now. Like calling us douche bags could hurt our feelings, make Rose feel bad about chucking a dirty tampon in his face. We stood on the curb and watched him get smaller and smaller. Rose held her hand up to shade her eyes against the last atomic-orange flare of the setting sun. The boy turned down a side street and was gone. Rose made a wet and scraping noise at the back of her throat and spit a glob onto the sidewalk. She wiped her skinny mouth with the back of her hand. An SUV cruised by and flattened the tampon. It looked like roadkill against the pavement, like a bit of pigeon or the bloodied tail of a rat.

  Another car stopped, with just a solitary man inside. Rose waved him along. He had perv vibes, she said. I tried to get her to tell me what the perv vibrations felt like but she couldn’t explain it. It was an intuitive thing, she said. I was happy to hear she had the ability to pick up on these invisible perverted rays since the driver had actually looked pretty okay to me. I wondered if it was reasonable to expect any sort of normal person to pick up a couple of hitchhikers. Isn’t it the sort of thing a normal person avoids? A blue pickup hurtled over toward us. There was a woman inside, which Rose noted and said, Score! poking a tiny fist into the air. The lady leaned over as far as her seat belt would allow.

  Can you take us to Revere Beach? Rose asked. She was using the voice of a different girl. It must have been her hitchhiking voice. It was softer and higher, like she’d filed down the gravelly points of her regular, more jagged, lifetime-smoker’s voice.

  I’ll take you anywhere except over state lines, the lady smiled. Her smile and her chipper voice seemed odd and I realized it was ’cause she was crying. She was a white lady with long orangey hair and a blotchy face. Little red splotches bloomed over her cheeks and her eyes were pink and puffy. You girls shouldn’t be hitchhiking, you know that? she scolded us, but her snot-clogged voice was teasing. I climbed up into the cab beside Rose. The lady had enormous boobs and a tight T-shirt covered with Chihuahuas. Every time she blinked, some residual tears squirted out her eyes and she wiped them away. I’m sorry, she laughed. Or pretended to laugh. I mean, she was freaking out. At least it looked that way to me. I snuggled up against the door as she swerved away from the curb and onto the street, the treaded tires rolling over Rose’s tampon mash. I hoped she could see where she was going with all that water in her eyes. Don’t be scared, she said. I know it’s scary to see adults cry, right? She laughed again. I’m a real waterhead.

  Rose seemed totally unaffected. It’s cool, she said. My mom cries all the time. She’s very emotional.

  The lady looked at Rose and then launched into this whole story about her boyfriend and how he caught her cheating on him, only she wasn’t cheating on him, it only looked like she was but she couldn’t explain it because he’d taken her cell phone and he’d smashed it with a cinder block. That’s how he caught me, she hiccuped. The phone. How he thinks he caught me. He thinks he knows the whole story! He doesn’t know shit! This lady was giving off some serious electrical vibes. The tight cab of her pickup felt stuffed with the angry wind of her mood, dense and crackling. The floor was a carpet of trash that rolled and snapped beneath my flops. Some rap-rock was yelling from the radio. Rose offered the freaking-out lady the use of our stolen cell phone. Oh, you are angels! She got newly emotional and a fresh rain of tears plopped onto her splotched face. She seemed seriously unstable. It took about fifteen minutes to get into Revere, then another few to reach the water and become snared in a clot of Revere Beach traffic. Bunches of oiled-up yahoos in tight clothes cruised around trying to pick each other up. The place was a real scene and we were only at its tip. Far down the way I could see a faint sparkle of light, maybe fast-food places, maybe the carnival. The lady was punching the tiny buttons on the cell phone, she was pushing the tiny machine into her slick face.

  Look for the address, Rose hushed to me. I cranked down the window and let the beachy air whip my face. My hair swirled up in little salty hurricanes, it blew around and grew thick with the ocean grit carried on the air. I licked my upper lip and tasted tangy sweat and beach. I watched the house numbers climb as the traffic crawled and the lady freaked out into the phone. First she was sorry, her voice all curled up and soft and weepy, and then she’d really lose it and start shrieking all sorts of angry words, mostly Fuck you and It’s not what you think. You know whenever anyone says, It’s not what you think, they’re totally lying. Rose reached over and pinched my leg with her finge
rnails. She’d pushed up the raggy end of my sweats to do it, and my body jolted with the eensy pain of her fingernails, chewed short, the polish gnawed, hurting my skin, and also with the simple and superunexpected reality of her touch. I had a friend, this girl Rose, famously a crazy bitch, hitchhiker extraordinaire, we were so comfy and tight we touched each other, she touched me, like it was no big whoop. She shot me a look that went with the pinch, like she was going insane trying not to crack up at the lady, munching the shit out of the inside of her mouth with all the strain of keeping her laughs inside. The truck crawled past the houses and into the realm of cruddy hotels, just one or two, ramshackle bars in between them and then nothing but the bars for a while, old-fashioned looking like the hotels, places that maybe were sort of fancy a long time ago but now were dingy and sad. I imagined the people on the insides were the same way, people who used to be okay and had hopeful sparks in their hearts but then something happened and they got dingy and sad, they began to droop on the inside and after a while you could see it in their faces, the way the skin cragged and discolored, and in their bodies too, all skeletal or else weirdly chubbed, bulging with problems. There were racks of motorcycles lined up outside some of the bars, some of them had fake palm tree insignia, hula-skirt material fringing the doorway even though there weren’t any palm trees or hula dancers in New England. The beer signs were constant neon twists in the windows. We crawled and crawled. People in the cars all around us were hollering out their windows, locating friends or harassing the various females shuffling around still in bathing suits. Bathing suits with heels, bathing suits with tiny cutoffs yanked over the ass, the white fringe of denim unraveling dreamily down their thighs. Everyone talking loud over the bassy rap that boomed out the car windows, the bassy rap occasionally dueling with something older and twangy or younger and screamy. I felt unreal in the midst of it all, somehow invisible in the salt air. The insane chaos of music and honking, of the hordes of squawking seagulls, their sticky feathers the same color as the poop they left all over the beach, all the mania somehow creating a calm for me. I turned to Rose. The woman was still yakking her teary yak into the phone and Rose was scavenging the landfill of fast-food styrofoam cups and burger rappers and empty cigarette packs on the truck floor. She pushed with her hands, creating trash tides that turned up pens and suspicious balls of crusty toilet paper, a cracked CD cover and a single rubbery flip-flop crusted with sand. What, baby? The lady asked her. What you looking for? Shut up! Just shut the fuck up! What is it darling? She kept the little phone clamped to her cheek the whole time, bouncing back between Rose and the man on the other end.